


Pull Over

by QuietlySomethingAlso



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Gen, Post-Episode: s05e16 Felina
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-10
Updated: 2019-02-10
Packaged: 2019-10-23 20:29:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17690300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuietlySomethingAlso/pseuds/QuietlySomethingAlso
Summary: An adrift Jesse gets advice from a ghost.





	Pull Over

Jesse leans into the gas. The speedometer pushes seventy. He ignores a stop sign as he turns a corner, and his stolen car swerves all the way into the opposite lane before he is able to correct it.

A few miles back, Walter White is bleeding to death from a bullet wound, or else he is already dead. Assuming he is still alive, and they get to him in time, it’s possible he could survive. If that’s the case, the cancer will kill him instead. He is in bad shape, wasting away.

He hears police sirens. Through a break in the trees, he spots flashing red and blue. He’s going almost twenty-five over the speed limit, so he slams on the brakes, and the girl next to him is forced to grab onto the car door to avoid flying out of the passenger seat.

“Jesus. It’s not NASCAR; you can pace yourself. Or at least put a seatbelt on.” Shaken, she takes a deep breath before relaxing back into her seat. “Wouldn’t _that_ be some irony? You survive all that shit, finally escape, and then ten minutes later crash into a tree and splatter your brains all over the inside of your windshield.”

Jesse grits his teeth, passes two cop cars on their way to the crime scene, and begrudgingly reaches over to put his seatbelt on. She doesn’t bother with hers.

“I like your beard, by the way,” she declares, shuffling to the side to admire him. “I mean, I know the circumstances are bad and all, but still. In a way, it’s kinda hot. Makes you look, like, rugged. You could pull off the sexy lumberjack look if you were a little more muscular.”

She traces a finger along his arm, and he trembles.

“Pretty rude to ignore someone when they’re trying to talk to you.” She kicks her feet up on the dashboard. “So, where are we going? New Zealand, right? Or… I guess you’re set on Alaska now.” She sneers at that. “ _My_ vote would be for New Zealand. Alaska sounds miserable. Gonna be cold as tits. And there’s, like… bears.” Desperate for attention, she shuffles around restlessly in her seat, but Jesse still won’t look at her. “Then again, you’re all furry now; you’d probably fit right in with them.”

Jesse has tired eyes. He can still hear police sirens in the background. He turns on the radio.

She turns it off. “They’re gonna be coming for you next, now that they got _him_. Your face is gonna be all over the news.” She still gets no reaction. After another minute, she adds, “What is Jake gonna think when he see _that_?”

Despite his best efforts, he lets out an audible groan. Exactly what she wants. The police sirens fade out in the distance, and then it’s just the two of them in the middle of the woods.

He tightens his hands around the steering wheel.

Finally, he grumbles, “…You don’t know about Jake.”

He glares at her, and she looks right back at him with a self-satisfied grin.

“I never _told_ you about Jake,” he emphasizes.

“So he _does_ speak, after all.” She takes a moment to appreciate it, smiling affectionately at him. Then she folds her hands behind her head and closes her eyes. “How would you know what you told me? You were high. You probably told me about all _kinds_ of shit you don’t remember.”

“I didn’t tell you about _him_. I wouldn’t have.”

“Wow. Brother of the year.”

“Fuck you.”

She laughs out loud in response.

“I need a smoke,” she declares, fishing around in the glove compartment with one hand. “-Oh, shit, there’s cash in here! Did you know there was cash in here? Like, two hundred bucks.”

There’s a lighter and a pack of cigarettes in there, too. She drops the wad of cash in the cup holder, and then she lights one, cracking the window to exhale the smoke.

“Hey… come on…” She offers him a cigarette. “Want one? You could use it.”

His eyes are half closed. “Yeah…”

She slips it into his mouth with two fingers before holding the lighter to it.

Her hand rests on his shoulder. “You need sleep. You’re exhausted. You need to sleep in an actual _bed_.”

“No,” he says gruffly, “I need to get out of here.”

“We’re going to Alaska?”

He cracks his own window to exhale smoke.

She leans away from him. “…Please get some sleep, baby.”

The car keeps on barreling down the road. They pass some buildings. They don’t run into any other cars until Jesse merges onto the highway.

Her feet are still kicked up on the dashboard when she asks, “How far do you think we’ll get before we get caught?”

Jesse’s eyes are fixed on the road. “We’ll _get_ there, alright?”

“Not if you fall asleep at the wheel.” She hums disapprovingly, flicking ash out of the window. “You have to admit, it’s a long shot. They’ll find you sooner or later.”

“I’ll be careful.”

“ _Will_ you? You’ve already come _this_ close to getting pulled over and we haven’t even made it out of Albuquerque yet. You’re bound to slip up, and they’re gonna catch you as soon as you do,” she says matter-of-factly. “Hear me out: yeah, you _could_ just keep driving, and see where that gets you. That’s one option. But here’s another- what about that guy? The vacuum cleaner guy? What about a clean slate?”

They look into each other’s eyes. Jesse drums his fingers on the steering wheel.

“I don’t know,” he says quietly.

She pouts at him. “He’s the safe option. If I were you, that’s what I’d be doing. Have him take me somewhere nice and quiet. Some cozy little lakeside town in Maine. Work at a bookstore, do my art in my spare time, maybe meet someone cute. See where it goes…” She leans on her hand, staring pensively out the window. “I think you could use something like that.”

“He’s too expensive.”

“Maybe not. Maybe you could find somewhere else to cook. Just until you can afford it.”

She makes the suggestion nonchalantly, flicking her cigarette butt out the window, but Jesse recoils as soon as he hears it.

“No. _No_. You serious?” He shoots her a venomous glance. “God damn it.”

“Well, you’re broke as shit now. If you want to start over… I mean, even if you go it alone, how are you planning on doing that? No offense, Jesse, but it’s not like you have any other skills. What, are you gonna make boxes for a living?” She lights another cigarette, taking a long drag on it before adding, “But you can make crystal. Jesus, can you ever make crystal…”

He rests an elbow on the door and hangs his hand out of the window, letting smoke trail out of the moving car from between his fingers. “I’m done cooking. I’m _done_. I don’t give a shit about making any more money. How can you not _get_ that?”

“What about the money that’s already out there? Because there _is_ still money. Like, eighty million, or close to it, right? That’s enough for a new start, and _then_ some.”

It catches him off-guard. They exchange a glance. She is not surprised to see him hesitate.

“Blood money,” she says bitterly. “Right? That’s what you’re gonna say?” She scoffs. “What a load of bullshit. It’s just money. And you need money. Even if you don’t want it.”

He won’t look at her anymore. “Stop it.”

“Everyone else gets to benefit from it? All those other people? Drew Sharp’s parents? Mike’s granddaughter? Who gives a damn if _they_ reap all the benefits from all that blood money? It just can’t be _you_ , right? You’re the sacred cow. You won’t be tainted with it. God forbid _you_ benefit.”

“Fuck you!” he spits, punching the wheel with one hand.

His voice is raised- strained- for the first time, but he still doesn’t look at her.

She slumps down into her seat, her eyes low. “Do what you want to do, Jesse. I’m just trying to help.”

She’s not upset. She’s pitying him.

Jesse sucks in his breath. “Sorry.”

“I know.”

He can feel her staring at him. Slowly, reluctantly, he looks her in the eye again.

“I mean it.” His voice breaks a little. “I’m sorry… I’m…”

“-I know, baby. I know.”

“I miss you.”

“I miss you, too.”

Her arm extends to him to caress his shoulder, her whole body shifted to the side. He stares out at the highway, flicking his cigarette out the window. She lights him another one.

“What do you figure Wendy’s up to?” she asks after a while.

He takes one hand off the wheel to wave her off. “She’s got a kid… if she gets caught with me, they’ll probably arrest her or question her or something.”

“Well. There’s that house up at Siesta Hills.” She flicks through the wad of cash in the cup holder. “You’ve got two hundred bucks. Option three. I’m just saying.”

“You’re the one who said that won’t help.”

“And _you’re_ the one who knew that was a load of NA bullshit, so I don’t see what your point is.”

She breathes smoke out the window again.

“I kinda liked NA,” Jesse mumbles, scratching his beard.

“Yeah. So did I. I was eighteen months clean before you came along, you know. But I knew that wasn’t gonna last forever, and hell, _I_ never even killed anybody.”

He shakes his head. “If I go back, I’ll get caught for sure.”

“If you go back, does it really make a difference?”

Jesse can’t think of a retort to that.

“Maybe what you need,” she says slowly, “is to just not feel anything. Even if just for one night.”

His whole face sags. He sucks in too much smoke and chokes on it. He rests his wrist on the wheel just to give himself the chance to rub his eyes.

“I’m so damn tired,” he groans.

She peers over the dashboard to look out at the highway. “Maybe we should pull over.”

Hand shaking, he raises the cigarette to his lips again. “I’m so tired.”

“Then _pull over_.”

Instantly, his foot slams into the brake, and the whole car rumbles off the road onto the shoulder. The two cars behind him whiz past, both, but it barely even registers to him.

His head falls back against the back of his seat.

“Okay,” he whispers. “Okay. Pulled over.”

He sighs, not bothering to turn toward the window and filling the car with a cloud of smoke. It fills his vision. He flicks another cigarette out the window without looking.

She gets up on one knee to climb between the seats, pushing against his shoulder with one hand to get him to turn and look at her. “Are you doing okay?”

His head lolls to the side. He doesn’t say anything. She watches him with wide, beautiful eyes.

It’s cold, and black, and dreary out. The smoke is still parting and escaping through the windows. But she is radiant. Like she’s standing in the sun. She hasn’t aged a single day. And she is as gorgeous as anyone he has ever seen.

She kisses him for a fleeting moment, not nearly long enough, and then pulls away, all the way back into her own seat, a mile from him. Her jet black hair obscures her eyes, and her face goes dark.

Her voice is sharp. “Can I ask you something?”

“Anything…” says Jesse.

She purses her lips, letting her cigarette burn all the way down to the end, before asking, “Why didn’t you kill him?”

She looks out the window, but now he won’t stop watching her.

“I…” Jesse shakes his head. “…He saved me.”

“He’s the one that put you there in the first place.” She lights herself a new cigarette, and then a second one for him. “I gotta say. After what he did to me… I’m a little offended.”

“It’s not _about_ you.” He gnashes his teeth together.

“Isn’t it? Then who _is_ it about? His wife? His kids?” She rolls her eyes. “Can you honestly say you can think of a single person that wouldn’t be better off with him dead?”

“He was gonna die either way.”

Her head snaps toward him.

“Then why couldn’t you do it?”

“Because it wasn’t my _job_!” He is more animated now. “I- I don’t need that! Okay? I don’t deserve it!”

“Did Gale deserve it?”

She raises an eyebrow.

He won’t fight her. He recedes back into his seat.

“Did Andrea?” she continues. “It’s always the wrong people that end up dead, isn’t it?”

More cars whiz past them. They’ve been there on the side of the road for ages now.

She seems disappointed that he doesn’t respond to that one. “…I liked her, you know,” she adds, as an afterthought. “I really liked her.”

He gives a defeated nod. “Yeah. I liked her, too.”

“Why did you break things off with her? Didn’t he want you to?”

“He, uh… he said it had to be my decision.”

“Yeah? And did _you_ want to break up with her?”

“No.” He snickers humorlessly. “God, no…”

“Funny how that works, isn’t it?”

“Yeah… I know.”

She rolls her tongue over her lips.

“…Maybe you could have kept her safe.”

“You don’t know, okay? You don’t know. You weren’t there for any of that.” He stubs his cigarette in the second, empty cup holder, not bothering to toss it out the window. Then he runs both hands through his hair. “God damn it. You weren’t _there_.”

Her response is simple, and obvious. “Of course I was.”

She pauses to let that sink in. He rubs a hand over his face.

“I…” he breathes, “…I’m sorry for what I did to you.”

“I know you are, baby.” She nods once, solemnly. “But what difference does it make?”

They both look out over the open road.

Jesse rubs the back of his neck. “I’m gonna get caught if I sleep here.”

“Then what’s the plan?”

“I don’t know,” he sighs. “But I’m tired.”

“You’ve got a lot weighing on you.”

“…Yeah.”

She takes a drag. “You don’t think about religion much.”

“No.”

“But it’s true what he said, isn’t it? If there’s a hell… that’s where you’re going. Do you think you can make peace with that?”

“What does it matter what _I_ think?” he scoffs.

“…Do you remember that tape you made? When you went to the DEA? Do you remember how it felt, getting all that off your chest?” She widens her eyes at him. “Confession. Maybe those Catholics are onto something.”

“What are you saying…?”

“Didn’t I already say it?” She drums her fingers over her knee, speaking off the cuff. “If you get caught… what difference does it really make? Maybe you could turn yourself in. Option four.”

His stomach is in knots for a moment, and he throws his head back, not really considering it before groaning, “God, what good would that do?”

She has an answer immediately. “Closure. Maybe not just for you. Maybe for everyone. I bet Drew Sharp’s parents would like to know what happened to their kid. I bet Brock would like to know what happened to his mom.” She points her cigarette in his direction. “Think about it. He’s going to be screwed up enough as it is without having to spend his life wondering what happened to her.”

Jesse freezes. “He’s got other family. They’ll take care of him…”

“More likely than not, he found his mother’s lifeless corpse on his front porch in a pool of her own blood. That’s not something you get over, ever.”

Her words pound into his head like a jackhammer. Something boils to the surface.

There are tears in his eyes now.

He whimpers. “Why are you doing this to me…?”

She just shrugs, unfazed. “I’m not.”

Leaning a little to the side to breathe smoke through the window, she watches with curiosity as Jesse collapses against the steering wheel, sucking in shaky breaths.

“You can cry if you want to. Nobody’s gonna hear.” At his disbelieving look, she rolls her eyes and adds, “Don’t worry. You already strangled a man to death tonight. I’m pretty sure in the grand cosmic scale of manliness, you’re still gonna break even.”

But Jesse doesn’t have the energy to cry, so he just closes his eyes and collects himself. She lights herself another cigarette.

After a long time, she asks, “What are you going to do?”

He looks at the floor. “I just got _out_ of prison. I can’t go back. I just…”

“So, that’s it, then? You’ve suffered enough already? Do you really believe that?”

He knows she is watching him. Expecting something from him.

All he says is, “I’m just so fucking tired.”

She touches him gently again.

“We passed a sign,” she suggests. “There’s a motel. I think it was a mile back.”

He does not take long to consider it. “Okay.”

“Yeah?”

“Okay…”

He starts the car. She kicks up her feet again. They don’t speak again for the next mile.

The motel she pointed out is cheap, and dingy, and familiar. Jesse tucks the cash into his back pocket along with the rest of the cigarette carton.

She follows him into the lobby.

At the front desk is a kid. He is not much younger than Jesse- but he seems like a kid.

“Whoa, man; what happened to _you_?” He says it the moment he gets a good look at Jesse’s face. “I, uh… I mean, are you… are you doing okay?”

She cuts in front of Jesse with a scowl, planting her palm firmly on the front desk. “What’s it to you, asshole?”

Jesse just rubs his eyes. “…Yeah, uh… I’m okay, thanks. I just want a room.”

The kid at the desk doesn’t think much of it. “Okay. What’ll it be, then?”

She rolls her eyes before replying, “Queen.”

Jesse sighs. “Uh. Just a single.”

“Okay. Forty bucks for a night,” says the kid.

“Can I pay cash?”

“Yeah.”

She leans back on the desk while Jesse digs through his pockets and counts out enough money for the room.

“…Thanks, man,” mumbles Jesse.

“No problem,” the kid replies.

“Dickhead,” she adds on the way out.

The room is small and cramped. She takes a seat on the bed immediately. Jesse locks the door behind them.

When he approaches, she slides out of the way to make room for him. He lies down over the sheets with his shoes still on.

“Tomorrow, then?” she asks, looking over him from her spot at the foot of the bed.

“Yeah… tomorrow.” He stares down the length of his body at her. “Can you just leave me alone so I can get some sleep?”

She frowns apologetically. “You know I can’t, baby.”

He turns away from her, sinking his head into the pillow. She lies down next to him, wrapping an arm around his chest.

“There’s always going to be a ‘tomorrow’.” She hums it into his ear. “Do you want to spend the rest of your life doing _this_? With _me_?”

He closes his eyes. “I can’t. I can’t do this anymore.”

She pulls herself in closer to him. He shivers from her touch.

“I’ll bet if you turn the news on right now,” she says, “they’re all talking about him.”

“Yeah. They probably are.”

Jesse doesn’t open his eyes.

“…Do you want to talk about option five?” she asks softly.

He takes a deep breath.

She nuzzles against the back of his neck. She’s smiling. “Being dead’s not so bad, you know. You can take it from me.”

He opens his eyes.

“I just want peace,” he says hoarsely.

“Well… so does everyone else.”

He turns over in bed. She slides back to accommodate him. They lie together, face-to-face.

“What about you?” Jesse asks. “Do you have it? Do _you_ have peace?”

She smirks. “Are you asking for your sake? Or mine?”

“…Mine.”

“Because it’s not really _about_ me, is it?”

Her hand slides down to his waist- and she slips a hand into his back pocket to swipe the cigarette carton.

She lights one for each of them, shuffling back against the headboard. He slides back to sit next to her, taking the one she offers him.

He places it between his lips with a grimace. “I’m sorry.”

“I know.”

“I loved you.”

She chuckles. “‘Loved’. I’m right here.” She rests a hand on his leg. “And I’m not going anywhere.”

He places his hand over hers. His head lolls back, and he stares at the ceiling.

“I don’t know what to do,” he admits.

“It’s okay. We’ll figure it out, baby.” She exhales smoke. “You and me.”


End file.
